Evergreen jockey Brennan rounds off fine season with big win at Sandown

IT was entirely appropriate that Paddy Brennan visited the winners’ enclosure on the last day of the cross-channel jumps season at Sandown last Saturday.

The Ardrahan native was chalking up his 82nd success of an excellent campaign when steering the Oliver Greenall trained Herbiers (15/2) to a comfortable success in the Novices Championship Final Handicap Hurdle.

Despite having turned 40 earlier this month, the Galway rider underlined that his prowess in the saddle remains undiminished in finishing sixth in the UK jockeys’ championship.

Having struck up a successful partnership with trainer Fergal O’Brien several seasons ago, Brennan now has a career total of over 1,300 wins and has captured some of the biggest prizes National Hunt racing has to offer.

Six-times triumphant at the Cheltenham Festival where he won the Gold Cup on Imperial Commander in 2010, he is probably most renowned for a terrific association with Cue Card, a horse he steered to five Grade Ones, including twice in the Betfair Chase at Haydock, and in Kempton’s King George in 2015.

On November 16, 2016, Brennan joined elite company by landing the 1,000th race of his career when successful on the O’Brien trained Colin’s Sister at Warwick. His most notable success on home soil came on God’s Own for the Tom George stable in the Champion Chase at Punchestown in that same year.

Though Brennan concedes that the travelling demands involved compromised any quest to become champion jockey, he achieved another milestone in the 2009/10 season when crashing through the century mark for the first time with 104 winners.

“I guess I’ve backed off any attempt to become champion jockey. England is a big country and there would be so much travelling involved. I wouldn’t be able to keep that pace up.”

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App

Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.

Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.

Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite  HERE.

Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.